OT- Sky phone scam

[David WE Roberts]

Just had a phone call from someone who sounded as though he came from the Indian sub-continent.

He said he was from Sky, and this was a follow up call - he wasn't trying to sell me anything (fat chance!!). When I insisted that he gave me a number to call back to confirm his identity he said "Incoming call" and hung up.

I have Googled this, and the type of scam is common and goes back many years. However I am not a Sky subscriber (not that I mentioned this) and the other reports have been from Sky subscribers.

And yes, I know that I could have had hours of harmless fun keeping him on the line but I happen to be busy at the moment :-)

I might have to put the answer phone on two rings for a while. There really should be some legislation to force these (usually overseas) calls to leave some valid ID behind or prevent them from completing. Report, trace, block; that might discourage them from preying on the naive and confused.

Cheers

Dave R

[Man at B&Q]

And your point is?

[Graham.]

So why don't you tell us what the nature of the scam is then? Do they ask you to "confirm" your credit card details, or something else?

[tim....]

There is, but how the heck do you enforce it?

tim

[David WE Roberts]

Because the caller didn't get as far as the scam. When I insisted on a call back number he gave up.

[Dave Liquorice]

You trust a call back number given to you by a cold caller? Oh well, I guess the IS one born every minute. B-)

[Robin]

Make it someone else's problem. Eg reduce overseas aid spending in India by 50p for every scam call from India (as measured by ONS supervised sampling)? Repeat as and when problem migrates.

[Chris J Dixon]

Only if he is still there when you call him back on that number ;-)

Chris

[David WE Roberts]

Didn't say I would use it. Just wanted to see if he would supply one that I could then check out on t'Internet. However he wasn't willing to give one, which makes him much less prepared than some other cold callers.

[Toby]

They are usually offering to sell you a service contract for the Sky box, the same happens with Dyson vacuum cleaners and other things people are likely to have in their house.

Not a scam as such, just sharp practice, but they word it so it sounds like they are calling from Sky etc, usually without saying so directly

[Man at B&Q]

Just stop all aid to India. They have enough mill- & billionaires whoc could show a little philanthropy close to home, not to mention their space program.

Goes for other countries too.

MBQ

[Mark]

Make caller ID compulsory. All UK telcos would be responsible for ensuring accuracy. Large fines imposed for breaches.

[John Williamson]

Caller ID very rarely works across national boundaries under BT, IME. If a call is not from a BT line, it tends to say either "Outside area" "Overseas call" or a paraphrasing of it. "Outside area" used to mean a Hull Telecom number, too. Gives me an easy way to screen Spam curry. "Unknown Number" normally means someone's hiding a UK number, and I ignore those, too.

[whisky-dave]

well I used to have an old tape recorder handy ready to play back some classic Derek and Clive

would be great fun for someone from the indian continent, might give them a better grasp of real English ;-) or some choice Klington from star trek.

Or of course just be polite and talk in another language even if it's a made up one, but that takes time# which is why I'd leave a tape or ipod running.

[Mark]

It says "Unavailable" for me. This is the case for all International calls.

If the CLI is available but withheld I see "Withheld".

If the telcos are make responsible then they either display a valid number (or withheld) or reject the call.

[dennis]

Its called choose to refuse or something similar. You can have it on any BT or Sky line and probably on virgin too. The caller gets an announcement that says if you want to call you have to display CLI.

[Mark]

That's no use. A lot of legitimate calls show unavailable or withheld.

[dennis]

8<

There is no reason why a legitimate call should not have a correct presentation number.. even BG can get it right so anyone should be able to.

[tim....]

But the reality is that they don't.

[Mark]

And /all/ international calls show up as "unavailable". Some are cold callers and some are clients.